The buildup went well and I managed to complete most of my sessions and long runs in the weeks before. At this point I was feeling confident and ready to go.
Then 2 weeks before the race I started to have a bad chest. I went to see the doctor and was told that I didn’t have any chest issues but they would do some precautionary tests.
In the few days before I felt much better but still had a slight concern.
My wife and myself arrived in Berlin late on the Friday night before the race and immediately bumped into someone else from the same running club.
On the Saturday we did some sight seeing and a little more walking than I would have liked. Then we fitted in some good carb loading before I got an early night.
The morning of the race was perfect conditions, a little cool and overcast.
The journey to the start was a simple one, a couple of stops on the underground and a short walk the the athletes village. Everything was well organised (as you might expect in Germany) and runners were directed to their start areas depending on the wave that you had been allocated.
I was in wave B which was a short distance from the start with only the elite and a few others in front. This was probably the closest I will ever be to Eliud Kipchoge in a race with him only being about 100 metres away.
With a couple of minutes to go with all the usual race prep done and extra layers of clothing removed I took my position on the road. At this point there was the usual buzz and sense of excitement, tinged with the usual nerves.
The race started really well, a couple of fast kilometres to start with all the excitement making me go a little faster than I had planned but then I settled into my pace and ran with a group of 3 from a Scottish club for a few more kilometres. After losing them going through a drinks station I tagged onto another little group where two guys were pacing a woman at the pace I wanted to be doing.
At the half way point things were feeling really good, I was within a few seconds of the pace that I was aiming for and not noticing much in the way of being tired.
Soon after this however things started to go wrong. Somewhere between 25 and 30 kilometres my pace dropped and I couldn’t get back on the pace that I wanted. From there on things just seemed to keep getting slower with me not being able to get my pace back up.
At a couple of the drinks stations I decided to grab a drink and slow to a walk whilst I drank it. Each time after this I was able to get a couple of reasonable kilometres of running in.
The last few kilometres were a struggle but the closer to the end I got the easier it was to tell myself that I was nearly there and only had to keep going for a few more minutes.
The finishing straight is easily the most iconic of any race that I have ever done, running through the Brandenburg Gate a couple of hundred metres before the finish line is a special feeling.
After the finish line I had my usual emotions, happy to have completed another marathon, but this time a little disappointed that I hadn’t managed to achieve the time that I had been hoping for.
Looking back now I realise that I probably hadn’t fully recovered from the cold and should maybe have been a bit more conservative in the first half to leave more for the later stages. Lessons that I can hopefully use in future marathons including New York that is only a few weeks away.
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